¿PUEDE EL ESTADO ABATIR UN AVIÓN CON INOCENTES A BORDO PARA PREVENIR UN ATENTADO KAMIKAZE? Comentario a la Sentencia del Tribunal Constitucional Federal alemán sobre la Ley de Seguridad Aérea

Authors

  • GABRIEL DOMÉNECH PASCUAL

Keywords:

right to life, human dignity, killing or letting die, necessity, terrorism.

Abstract

The German Federal Constitutional Court has recently overturned a controversial statute that allowed the Administration to shoot down hijacked airplanes with innocent people on board in order to avoid Kamikaze attacks. According to the Court, the fact of killing innocent people to save others hurts human dignity and their right to life, which is not of less value than other human lives. The Court states, moreover, that, in the uncertain situation in which the challenged rule should be applied, there is serious danger that the Administration orders the shooting down impetuously and the unnecessary killing. The author criticises these arguments and considers that the decisive argument to judge the validity of the rule is to determine whether it minimizes or not the risk to human life.

Published

2008-04-09

Issue

Section

FOREIGN ADMINISTRATIVE REPORT